I have no idea what a mothball smells like. Are you guys saying that's the myrrh smell?

Yes. And to some people myrrh roses smell like moth balls. It doesn't smell moth balls to me. WOH smells like a delicious old fashioned candy, a hint of caramel, a hint of lilac and lots of licoricelicorice finishing with marshmallow.

Magpie, Librarian

Yes, Mothballs smell like myrrh to me. I agree, we can have different fragrance preferences, but it’s good to know how a variety smells before you buy it. I bet you love Sceptre d’Mothball Isle, too, Librarian.

I haven't smelled that one! But I love Carding Mothball.

Lol, Librarian, I had almost mentioned Carding Mothball Mill as part of Austin’s Closet Helpers Rose Trio. I think it’s a missed opportunity that they don’t market them on HSN. Enjoy it a vase, then throw them in a closet. Watch all those moths fly away!

LOL love these names. I love the scent of Strawberry Mothball. To me it smells like honey and something medicinal, like anise.

I'm with you, clearly, on li.king myrrh, Magpie 😁

This was a fun exchange, thanks, Ben!

Librarian, I wish I had bought Wollerton. Now I'm not sure where I'd put it, but it's on my list for future purchases if one of my climbers ever gets removed. Why does my "rose wishlist" never seem to get smaller?

I dont really smell my roses unless they are super fragrant like Jude the Obscure, in full sun it‘s amazing.

My wishlist got too big, too! If you ever have room for Wollerton, Magpie, I hope you get to try it. I don't know if it is truly a climber in your zone, but it blooms wonderfully when pruned as a shrub, too (unlike Polka).

I love the smell of Carding Mill so I must also be in the mothball camp🤷🏻‍♀️

Ben - I can't remember the fragrance...but I remember that I loved it. :) :) I also remember that she has thorns that grab on and tear the skin. But I'd still get her again. :):) She's a big rose.

Librarian - oh man, what a great description!! You're good at that!

Carol, no worries, it’s better I don’t get tempted to try her again.

Ben, yes the fragrance was very similar to WOH, but mine was never that pretty. To me, Wollerton smells like black licorice, I’ve heard others say it smells similar to a fennel bulb which makes sense- anise. Bathsheba has a honey note that completely changes her myrrh and makes it more pretty- granted her fragrance isn’t as strong as WOH IMO. The first year with WOH I hated the fragrance, but I’ve come to appreciate it, but it’s not my favorite fragrance.

Librarian, if you find the space I encourage you to give it a try, I have mine in a large pot and it keeps it a manageable size.

Nick,

I agree, the roses that have some other scents mixed with myrrh smell much better. Mme Anisette is myrrh with buttercream, Summer Romance is myrrh with rose and lemon, to me they smell much better that the straight up myrrh roses. I just purchased Bathsheba, looking forward to growing her. And even I prefer even a myrrh-only scent to none at all, I just don’t like it as much as the fruit, rose or perfume scented varieties.

Carol

I remember you also didn’t care for myrrh…so I guess Soeur Emanualle must have something more going on in the scent department, at least in your climate.

100% agree Ben

Ben - yeah, like you said,...it must have been myrrh with something else. :)

I don’t grow Cathedral Bells, but am obsessed with smelling it every time I visit the Huntington Gardens. My idea of a straight myrrh fragrance is Distant Drums. To me, Cathedral Bells smells quite different from this: distinctly herbal with notes of lavender! I think there’s also some anise and myrrh there. It’s a fascinating, sophisticated, unusual fragrance, but not easy to define and probably not universally popular. Personally, I love it. Here are a few photos I took of it last summer at the Huntington.

Cathedral Bells aka Soeur Emmanuelle aka Towering Rose Magic, which aptly describes its growth habit in my climate …

When they named the rose ’Towering Rose Magic’, I thought they had planned its future well for when it will appear at nurseries of ill repute with fantastical names. Its as if the Henry Field / Michigan Bulb folks named it thinking ahead to year 2040 when it lost its patent.

I‘m amazed that people can smell distinct fragrance from the roses, i simply can’t. Plus I'm avoiding pollen because i can start a sneeze fest.

I did purchase a Cathedral Bells from Huntington last year, then i purchased Soeur Emmanuelle from Heirloom. I only realized they were the same rose when I saw the same identical picture at both site.

But so far I'm withholding my judgement on this rose, i haven't had a decent picture yet. Maybe this year.

SoCal, same here. This discussion has given me a complex about my defective smeller. To make matters worse, the dry air here stops all wafting of scent outside dead in its tracks. I have to have an inside bouquet to get an idea of a rose's scent. Allergies surely don't help, either, though I don't think I'm allergic to roses at all. I'm more allergic to this (see below) Diane

Guess?

Rubber rabbitbrush?

I agree Jude does smell so, so good. But I'm pretty sure mine died over the winter this year ☠️ RIP

Magpie, just good old sagebrush (also know as greasewood). It's everywhere out here. Tell us more about rubber rabbitbrush. Diane

It's covered in pollen in early fall.

Diane, here is a photo (not mine) of rabbitbrush, a common enough site around my neck of the... prairie. Drought tolerant, blooms at the very end of summer/early fall. Beloved by bees. Beautiful when in bloom, but not particularly notable during the rest of the year. Still, gotta love that splash of bold color on a plant that can handle living here with no supplemental irrigation.

Magpie, we'd call that sagebrush here. That's all I've ever heard the stuff called. I should do some research, I guess. I hope your Jude didn't die over winter. I do consider him one of Austin's less cold hardy roses--in fact of all my Austins, he is the least cold hardy, and when we had a zone 5 winter in 2016-7, I thought he was done for, but he came charging back. And now mine is starting his 19th year and as big as ever. He's grafted on Huey and came straight from David Austin. Diane

2021-- Sorry I got the dates all garbled. What a comeback for this rose.

2022

2017 after zon5 winter, making the long journey back.

Jude is so gorgeous! If i ever see locally, i think I'm going to have to break my pause on buying roses and get him. I love, love, love WOH and they remind me f each other. Magpie, i hope yours comes back

Diane, sagebrush and rabbitbrush are in the same plant family, but are different plants. Jude looks pretty dead to me BUT since it's only March, I guess there's still a chance for it. Looking back through my photos, the roses don't start leafing out again until the very end of April. Sigh, quite a ways to go still!

DesertRose - when I grew Distant Drums, I had to get rid of it...the myrrh fragrance went over my whole yard and I hated it. Yuck! So I totally agree with you about DD being totally myrrh.

GardenNut - oy vey...you bought the same plant...those tricky buggers. LOL

Magpie - what a shame that your Jude (maybe) died. Of course, mine did too when I grew it. ;)

I should mention that the fence behind Jude is 9 feet tall--3 feet of real adobe topped by 6 feet of wood fence. It took about two seasons for Jude to completely regrow.

Librarian, I noticed that Wollerton Old Hall does look a lot like Jude. The actual garden around the old hall is gorgeous, one of my favorites in England, and often featured in English Gardening Magazine. Diane

Rosecanadian: I like the myrrh smelling roses, but my dry climate probably mitigates their intensity quite a bit. Also, I’ve never experienced a mothball, so I don’t have that negative association! If I did, I can imagine why Distant Mothballs might be preferable to mothballs in close proximity. :)

Diane,

Yes, I also think Jude looks like Wollerton, to the detriment of the ignorant. One smells like a bowl of delicious fresh cut tropical fruits, the other a bowl of old hall mothballs! Smellers beware, you’ve been adequately forewarned.

Carol

I agree Distant Drums is myrrh, but I think its not as bad as Mothball Hall, Mothball Mill, Mothball Hill and Mothball D’Isle. You should probably avoid them.

Unless, that is, you.like myrrh 😁. But everyone has heard my description of delicious WOH fragrance. I like eating cilantro and black licorice too. I know I'm an odd(moth) ball.

Ben, what do you think of Julia Child ''s fragrance? I find it another delicious myrrh variation.

Just a thought- I'll bet Distant Drums has a fragrance that varies with location. My experience with it was that it smelled of myrrh not long after it had been planted from growing in a pot but after that, not at all. It had a nice fragrance, though. I'm not so sure I remember but I think maybe fruity? My soil is dry, infertile, and rocky with excellent drainage- the only excellent thing about it. It is also off-the-charts acidic. Azaleas and blueberries grow here easily with out any soil additive.

DD linage is September Song- a Buck rose said to have a fruity fragrance x The Yeoman- a David Austin rose which has the myrrh fragrance. Austin roses, except for Munstead Wood, were never happy here and most looked for any excuse to die. I wonder if soil composition here just did't allow 'The Yeoman' fragrance to come through so DD only gave off the scent it inherited from September Song? I don't know how rose scent is inherited but I don't think it's as simple as a single dominant/recessive gene.

This is only a guess but it might explain why a rose's scent can be experienced so differently by different people.

Librarian, cilantro tastes like soap to me but I do like black licorice (as long as it has the good and plenty candy coating)!

Librarian

I agree Julia Child smells nice, there’s a strong old rose tone to balance out the anise.

Outsteelers

Ina Garten (the Barefoot Contessa) always avoids cilantro in her recipies, it tastes like soap to her, too. But I like it just fine.

i can’t even detect any fragrance from Julia Child.

I must admit i like parsley much better, plus I can grow it here, not cilantro. Store bought cilantro tends to go bad very fast here. But i just learned a trick from Jacques Pepin, he freezes cilantro.

Hoho, Ben. Didn't you know that soylent cilantro is people soap? Julia Child hated it, too. It's a genetic thing, sort of like the phenolphthalein tasters, which I am. I do love black licorice. I detest cilantro. Diane

So I had to join in.... I've just put Mothball D’Isle in the ground; and Have Mothball Hall due to arrive any moment. I've been laughing so much reading all the commentary. Gosh, I hope I don't hate the fragrance when I finally smell it... good thing I haven't ordered Mothball Drums! lol

DesertRose - :) :)

Ben - LOL I will...I've been forewarned. Thanks. :)

Librarian - I can't stand black licorice. But, I admit a lot of people do. :)

Karen - Austins try to die (and mostly do) for me too. I'm trying a few Austins this summer because I'm a masochist. :)

Kimberly,

I bet in zone 10b you’ll be enjoying a very Myrrhry Christmas with your extensive mothball collection!

SoCal

I agree parsley is a much ore versatile herb, I like the flat leaf italian best.

Diane,

I had also read the cilantro soap thing was genetic, hopefully not for too many people born in Mexico where it’s use is prevalent.

It's use is prevalent here, too, Ben. I'm the only one in my family that hates cilantro. The rest use it with gusto on Asian and other food. I refuse to grow it for them. I already grow lots of hot peppers, and that's enough. Friend Elaine loves her flat leaf parsley and grows it. We gobble basil, which I grow, and daughter makes a lot of pesto every year. Our basil crop is big and we give it away often. It's also used in Asian food here. Son in law is an excellent cook of many Asian dishes.All this discussion of mothballs--yech. I had a friend whose home reeked of the stuff, the last vestiges of 1950s moth battles, I guess. Diane

My favorite rose doesn't smell like mothballs.

Oh, Diane!!!! Your Augusta Luise is SWOONable!!!! PLOP. :) :)

Love this thread! My favorite roses for fragrance are Marie Pavie, G Nabonnand and Cl. Crimson Glory. I have some new ones planted that hopefully will have good fragrance, which are Princesse Charlene de Monaco, Fun in the Sun, Huntington’s 100th/Life of the Party and Bolero. Monsieur Tillier is my favorite for its shape, being a huge shrub, and blooming like crazy all winter; he rests in the summer.

Is narcissus paper white supposed to be a pure myrrh fragrance? I dislike it’s fragrance. I also find that Lady of Shallot smells like paper whites sometimes. The Carding Mills at Huntington Gardens smells amazing to me though and not at all like Lady of Shallot. I need to find Cathedral Bells there.

Karen Service, where are you located with both dry and acidic soils? That seems like a rare combination. I agree that scent on a rose can change. My Lady of Shallot sometimes has “stinky” flowers and sometimes blooms that smell amazing.

Narcissus Paperwhites don't smell like myrrh roses to me.

Narcissus paperwhite smell stinky to me, but at all like myrrh, I do think some other narcissus smell wonderful, varieties such as Winston Churchill, Geranium and Sacred Lily.

Narcissus Geranium

Hi, Stephanie. I live in Eastern TN on a hillside in the foothills of the Smoky Mtns. My soil type isn't unusual here: https://utcrops.com/soil/soil-fertility/soil-ph-and-liming/ but might be uncommon elsewhere. This probably tells you more than you wanted to know.

I don't like the smell of paperwhites either but I don't think that's a myrrh fragrance. To me, it smells like someone using a perfumed aerosol spray to cover the smell of rotting meat. I wonder what pollinator it's trying to attract?

On the other hand, some of the old-fashioned daffodills have a lovely (to me) fragrance. I grow a variety called Lent lilies here in the South. They look like a smaller, earlier, less spectacular version of modern trumpet daffs but are still lovely and smell nice.

Karen,
Wow! There are a great many different soil types in Tennessee. I have a clump of Narcissus Grand Soleil d’Or planted near the front door, which has a beautiful sweet wafting fragrance and starts blooming just after Christmas here. It’s the first Spring bulb here. The Paperwhite version is planted all over the rose Garden at Descanso Gardens near my house and it smells a little like an acetone based nail polish remover to me. Amazing how different everyone’s nose is! I get similar fragrance from some of the Austin roses like Lady of Shallot and sometimes Golden Celebration, but not always as I am guessing the weather can change the scent.